Take a pinch of autumn wood
a tablespoon of dew
an ounce of silver birchtree bark
a spiderweb or two.
Add the taste of morning mist
a crystal cloud of moss
the sodden smell of fallen leaves
one sadness, half a loss.
Blend with a rustling underfoot
a blackbird’s yellow bill
the browns of pinecones on the ground
the distant grey of hills.
Warm with that ray of sinking sun
stir with the twilight breeze –
and drink before the thrush’s song
fades from the winter trees.
After the geysers come the restless nights.
I’m my own Yellowstone: as sulphur mists
dissolve the rim of consciousness
my superheated soul spouts similes,
mixed metaphors thud from the mudpool
of my bubbling brain, hissing hyperboles
ricochet off the walls of lodgepole pine;
from underneath the floorboards fumaroles
steam acid vapour. The silver lining
to these endless nights: sleeplessness
crystallized in syllables; the scalloped edge
around the hotspring of my seething mind.
whypoetry 